


Danny

by Black Hole Bullshit (orphan_account)



Category: Original Work
Genre: World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-11-16
Updated: 2008-11-16
Packaged: 2017-11-11 06:50:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/475757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Black%20Hole%20Bullshit





	Danny

As I trudge through puddles of mud and blood on the second day at camp, I reflect upon the day before. It was the first day at camp and we arrived at 1800 hours. I had been in my tent telling Danny about my girl back home. I told him about how beautiful she was and that we intended to get married when I got home. This made my heart start to pound just a little more powerfully. As the words dripped out of my mouth like droplets from a water faucet, which had not been turned off completely, I could just see her, my Elizabeth. Her blond hair was wavy and never clipped back. Her lips were crimson, unmatchable. I missed that bronze hair and those soft, lined lips.  
  
Regrettably, Sergeant Grant called the troop out the next minute, interrupting my moment of reminiscing. The stern and immortal-seeming man was going over our busy schedule for tomorrow. I take into account just how deep his voice was and how every other syllable sounded like someone was thumping on a bass drum. I looked up at the sky. The clouds were brilliant and it looked as though a painter had come and infused his brush about in the blue tinted sky. They were just the right shade of gray and the blocked the sun just so my eyes could stand to look into the above and beyond.  
  
I saw something peculiar then. It was red and as I recall, it was just a speck and then another and then again, it came, but it didn’t come from where my eyes had been stationed. No. It took me that long moment and then I realized Sarge wasn’t speaking anymore. I looked down quickly, putting my eyes to look at the normal level and see what was right in front of me. When I saw a missing body, I looked further downward. Sarge was lying in the revoltingly brown mud and my wits were restored.  
  
All of the men around me were yelling, screaming, some of them. I felt Dannys' hand grip my elbow. He was shaking a little, but I may have been as well. He pulled me into the muck and as I landed, with a bit of pain, absorbed by my shock, dots of mud flicked onto my already perspiring face. We crawled, just as we had learned at boot camp, to our flimsily built tent as hot, metallic bullets were streaming ever which way, all around us.  
  
We took our rifles with us as we stood up and turned around. There we saw the Japanese, our enemies in this war. We hadn’t expected them so soon. We were new out there, fresh from training and still they came after us. It was such an introduction to reality that I could hardly stand it. I believe part of me understood it as a dream. It didn’t seem as though human beings could really operate in such a way, so brutally, but I learned, as I know now, that the world isn’t a perfect place. As I was shooting, firing at any enemy I saw, I was forced to watch friends and enemies fall to the ground I stood on.  
  
Suddenly I heard something heavy fall beside me. I looked over and it was an American, one of my friends, one of my comrades. He must have been standing at the side of the tent, a little behind Danny and me. Then, without warning beside the man whose head was resting at my feet, I felt the cold metal of a rifle on the back of my neck. My reaction went in slow motion. I turned my head and my torso, which then caused complete loss of breath as I saw Danny, pointing his loaded weapon at me.  
  
Danny, smiling slightly, looked around and then began running backwards, toward the darkness and shelter of the trees, shot my leg and left me to die. The next thing I knew, I had blacked out and fallen to the reddish brown mud. I only remember a little about how it felt. I know that the vision started fading from me and it felt kind of like falling asleep mixed with immense pain.  
  
This morning I woke up to find the aide frantically checking pulses. I think he was in near panic from thinking he was alone. This made me realize what I had forgotten in my faint and I grabbed my wounded leg, sharp pains destroying my unreal calm. Kelso, the brunette aid heard me yelp. He looked up from a corpse and came bounding over to me.  
  
“Hey Snyder! I’m so glad you’re alive. I mean - you woke up.” His happiness from seeing my moving body dulled rapidly. “It looks like it’s just you and me,” he stated, dread hidden behind his sketchy voice. “Oh, I have a letter for you. Found it on your bedroll when I went in there looking for an extra rifle and ammo. You know, just in case,” Kelso nodded. I knew what he was saying. That’s the first thing I would have done when the living Japs, if any, left. I would have protected myself by gathering arms and then checked for living people.  
  
“Thanks,” I said lamely as he handed me the crumpled and dirtied note with his quaking hand. I wanted to grab his fist for a moment and steady it, pat it until he calmed, but we were grown men and he seemed much better than either of us should be. I admit, that I am much better than I ought to be.  
  
As I opened up my letter, Kelso said, “It’s from Danny… I-I’m sorry Snyder; Danny’s dead.” I didn’t care. I was almost glad I felt anger and rage searing me inside and out, pumping through my bloodstream. I thought he was a coward, a fool and a traitor. I hated Danny. I was about to crumple the foul-looking paper up and throw it away, but as I began squashing it in my hands, Kelso gave me a look that was the beginning of being horrified. It reminded me how I had thought Danny was my friend. That thought made me angrier at the same time as it convinced me I should read the note. I wanted to see if there was explanation.  
  
This is what the letter read:

_Snyder,_  
Sorry about your leg. It must have hurt and I must have scared you. You know we were just talking about your lady and I didn’t want that jeopardized. I did it, hoping the Japanese would think you were dead. I’m sure Kelso will take real good care of your leg. I am hiding in the trees right now. I’m writing this because I may not get the chance to tell you about it. I hope my plan works and I hope you get back home all right. I want to come to the wedding, but if I can’t make it, congratulations!  
Your Best Friend,   
Danny  
P.S. Sorry for not getting you a wedding gift. 


With a tear in my eye, I slowly folded up the note and said, “Kelso, where did you find Danny?” The pain in my leg had sub-sided as I took in the information from the scribbled words on the paper I held tightly. I realized that Kelso had also been bandaging it the whole time. He held his hand, sturdier now, out with a pain pill for me to take. I grabbed it quickly, knowing the pains would come back soon and I threw it into my mouth and swallowed hard as Kelso began to reply.  
  
“Over in the middle of those Japanese soldiers,” he pointed away from the tent toward this strange circle of bodies. “Listen, I’m really sorry.” I could tell he was sincere, because his head hung low as if Danny had been my brother. I thought that maybe he was about to cry, but he didn’t.  
  
“It’s okay – I mean, it’s not, but he di-died,” I had to force the word out with utmost difficulty, “honorably.” I’m not certain I could understand though. Why hadn’t he stayed in the woods? I walked over to the place Kelso had pointed out. There I found Danny with seven wholes in his chest, no ammo, I saw. I picked up his rifle and looked at the deadly machine closely, then threw it on the ground beside him. The circle of dead Japanese surrounded him. “I think he killed them all,” I said shakily, but proudly. I was proud, but accompanying the feeling was a sense of great loss. “I’m proud of him even if he didn’t.”  
  
“He did. I saw him,” Kelso started, but I could see him getting more and more uncomfortable. It did make me wonder where he had been that he lived, but I realized he was the aid and that he had to stay alive in order to help others. “Let’s get out of here,” he sighed.  
  
Kelso stood beside me and took my elbow to help me take some of the weight off my wounded leg. So, now we are here, walking around, waiting for help to come and get us. Kelso had already called using one of the walkie-talkies. Because of Danny I have a life and will have a wife and family someday.  
  
It’s ironic sometimes, how things seem to be and how they really are. A man who seemed to be a traitor was actually my savior. That man was Danny Duke.


End file.
